A 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruling on violations of the Telephone Consumer Protection Act blurs the lines between residential and business phone numbers in such cases and could make it more difficult for defendant companies to have TCPA suits dismissed early, attorneys told us Thursday. The decision in Chennette v. Porch (docket 20-35962) has “shifted the burden to the defendant” in TCPA cases involving business to business calling to show that the receiving number isn’t a residential use cellphone, said Kelley Drye attorney Becca Wahlquist in an interview.

The village of Muttontown, New York, asked for a two-week deadline extension to Oct. 26 to answer a complaint that the municipality dragged its feet on AT&T's application to remedy a service gap, per a letter motion filed Tuesday (docket 2:22-cv-5524) at the U.S. District Court in Central Islip, New York. AT&T consented to the delay, according to a stipulation attached to the letter motion. U.S. Magistrate Judge Lee Dunst granted the motion Thursday.

Amazon and Amazon Web Services “expressly deny” they violated the Illinois Biometric Information Privacy Act by using the company’s Rekognition facial-imaging technology to monitor employees in Amazon fulfillment centers, said the companies in a recent notice of removal (docket 1:22-cv-05159) in U.S. District Court in Chicago. Amazon and AWS “intend to defend this matter vigorously,” they said.

Dish Network wants the D.C. Circuit to rehear its arguments that the FCC’s authorization of a license modification for SpaceX’s Starlink satellite system to fly at lower altitudes will lead to interference with Dish’s satellite TV business, said a petition for panel rehearing or rehearing en banc filed in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit Tuesday in docket 21-1123, Viasat v. FCC (see 2208260035). “Without a rehearing, SpaceX will continue to operate its enormous nongeostationary satellite system at power levels that risk causing interference into many millions of households receiving satellite television service,” said the filing.

Some users of the Public Access to Court Electronic Records (Pacer) system run by the federal judiciary could see full refunds of the fees they paid to access federal court documents, according to a proposed settlement agreement between three nonprofits and the federal judiciary submitted Tuesday to U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.

The Supreme Court will almost undoubtedly recast or cut back the broad immunity that interactive online platforms enjoy via the Communications Decency Act's Section 230 liability shield, but the dearth of high court precedent on Section 230 makes it unclear how the justices will change that legal status quo, legal experts told us. The court granted cert last week to two related cases on social media platforms' legal protection when they are used in conjunction with terror attacks (see 2210030036).

This is the inaugural issue of Communications Litigation Today, the newest information service from the publisher of Communications Daily. It has been conceptualized in close consultation with Comm Daily subscribers, who identified a need for timely coverage of federal and state legal developments affecting telecom, tech and media companies, with a focus on keeping industry professionals informed about significant judicial proceedings.

Dish Network’s “baseless” demand to “claw back” license fees it paid the Pac-12 Network to carry a full slate of games for the 2018 and 2019 college football seasons to compensate for the COVID-19-shortened 2020 season runs “contrary to the plain language” of the parties’ license agreement, alleged the network in a breach of contract complaint Thursday (docket 1:22-cv-02620) in U.S. District Court in Denver.

U.S. District Judge Thomas Durkin in Chicago on Friday denied T-Mobile’s motion to transfer the class action challenging its Sprint buy as anticompetitive to the same Southern District of New York court that cleared the transaction in early 2020. Durkin on Tuesday set a telephone status hearing for Oct. 21 at 9:45 a.m. CDT.

U.S. District Judge Diane Humetewa in Phoenix denied the motion of Kelli Ward, chair of the Arizona Republican Party, for an injunction quashing the House Jan. 6 Select Committee’s T-Mobile subpoena for Ward’s phone records as part of its investigation into her efforts to thwart certification of the 2020 election. It was Humetewa's second rejection of Ward's injunction request in less than a month, forcing the Arizona GOP chief's appeal to the 9th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in late September.